They work tirelessly all day under the harsh rays of a blazing sun, the stench of death and destruction around them. They are a team of Jewish heroes who are working around the clock with one mission: the recovery of human bodies.

The SA Friends of the Beit Halochem Zahal Disabled Veterans Organisation was established in Johannesburg in 1982, its primary goal being to help and support Zahal disabled veterans by raising funds to help them return and resume their normal lives as soon as possible.

There’s a popular weekly satirical show in Israel called Eretz Nehederet. In a recent episode, an actor playing Benny Gantz, the former Chief of Staff of the Israel Defence Forces (IDF) and newcomer to Israeli politics, is asked how he’s feeling.

Devotion to the cause of the State of Israel flourishes in the most unlikely places, even in societies where the Jewish presence is small to non-existent. Such is the case in Mozambique, where the work of Beth-El Associacao Crista Amigos De Israel - Mozambican Christian Friends of Israel - testifies to how much can be achieved by those inspired by their Christian faith to promote the Israeli cause, despite adverse conditions.

JNF’s unique “Blue Boy Box” now lives at King David Linksfield Pre-Primary so that children of each generation learn the importance of tzedakah (charity or welfare). It is the responsibility of Jews all over the world to build Israel, develop it and nurture it as the home of the Jewish nation

“Knowledge is Light” was our school motto when I was a child in Durban. The importance of education was made clear to us from as far back as I can remember. It wasn’t taken for granted. A good education was a privilege.

(JTA) Norwegian rapper not charged with hate speech
A Norwegian rapper who cursed Jews while performing at an event in Oslo promoting multiculturalism will not be charged with hate speech, because his words may have been criticism of Israel, prosecutors said.

Did Israeli soldiers violate international law by deliberately targeting unarmed children, journalists, health workers, and people with disabilities during the past year of violence along the Israel-Gaza border?

(JTA) After the New England Patriots beat the favoured Kansas City Chiefs to reach their third straight Super Bowl – their amazing ninth in less than 20 years – CBS sports analyst Boomer Esiason made an intriguing statement, namely that Patriots wide receiver Julian Edelman belongs in the Pro Football Hall of Fame.

We are winging our way towards Human Rights Day (21 March), the first public holiday of the year, which coincides with Purim. I can’t help but wonder about our concept of human rights and what it means, not least of all, to our government.

President Cyril Ramaphosa confirmed in parliament last week that South Africa intended to downgrade its diplomatic presence in Israel. The foreign affairs bureaucracy was working “feverishly” on the matter. “The decision to downgrade the embassy in Israel is informed precisely by the violation of the rights of Palestinians and we are therefore putting pressure on Israel. But at the same time, we are saying we are willing to play a role and ensure there is peace,” said Ramaphosa.

Undeterred, and in spite of the hate-filled disparagement that spewed forth when Shashi Naidoo uttered positive comments about Israel and Jews last year, Haafizah Bhamjee penned a reasoned and sensible article on Israel and the Palestinians in the SA Jewish Report of 22 February.

With Prince William’s historic visit to Israel this week, all eyes have been trained on the Jewish capital. It may have taken 70 years, but the first official visit by a member of the British Royal family began in Israel on Monday, when William, the Duke of Cambridge, arrived in Tel Aviv.

Some 5 600 emissaries (shluchim) from Chabad-Lubavitch from all over the world gathered at the Pier 8 warehouse in Brooklyn, New York this week for the opening of their four-day annual international conference and banquet, 75 years after the arrival of the Lubavitcher Rebbe Menachem Mendel Schneerson, from Europe.

One of the questions that haunts the story of Purim and moves silently through the lines of the Megillah is clear and chillingly simple: How could Jews have chosen to remain in Persian Shushan? It was so clearly an environment in which anti-Semitism was so prevalent that a genocide could be planned and almost implemented without comment by broader society.

“The greatness of our nation is that our people are great. We are a nation of heroes, of people with good and decent moral fibre who will not tolerate our country being plundered!” So said Chief Rabbi Warren Goldstein in Pretoria this morning.“This is a struggle for accountability and justice,” Goldstein told the crowd (which included prominent Jewish CEOs like Adrian Gore, Stephen Koseff and Michael Katz). “This struggle is about sovereignty. The power of the people always triumphs in the end.”

World Jewish News

Ben Helfgott: From concentration camp to knighthood

Among the hundreds of British subjects on the Queens Honours List this June was Ben Helfgott, a holocaust survivor, an Olympic weightlifter, holocaust educator par excellence, and now a knight.

by
JORDAN MOSHE | Jun 28, 2018

Before Helfgott turned 15, his father, mother, and sister were shot by the Nazis. He went from a ghetto to several concentration camps, transported in cattle cars.

And yet, 11 years after being liberated, he participated in the Olympic Games as a weightlifter, representing his new home, Britain.

This month, his life and work were recognised with a knighthood, and he will henceforth be known as Sir Ben Helfgott.

“I couldn’t believe it,” Helfgott said about the knighthood. “I’m choked. Obviously, I’m very pleased. All my life, I’ve worked to educate about the Holocaust and I will continue to do so.”

The achievement is deserving of celebration in South African as well. Helfgott’s wife, Arza, was born in Zimbabwe, and their son is married to South African-born Thea Kilov. Helfgott is one of a group of prominent Jews recognised this year for their contributions, including historian Simon Schama, philanthropist Lloyd Dorfman, and MP Louise Ellman.

Unlike other honours, the British Empire Medal is not awarded by the Queen or Prince of Wales, or at the palace, but by Lord-Lieutenants, who are the representatives of the Crown for each county in the United Kingdom, as it is seen as more of a community award. Although scrapped in 1993, the award was revived by David Cameron in 2013 to recognise “the dedication and hard work so many provide to their communities” and is awarded to “ordinary people”.

However, Helfgott is no ordinary person. Ben Helfgott was born in Piotrków, Poland, and was 10 years old when Germany invaded the country in 1939. Helfgott and his father, Moishe, escaped the initial roundups of Jews, and found work in a local factory. In December 1942, 500 people, including Helfgott’s mother Sara, and sister Lucia, were moved to nearby woods and shot. In the summer of 1944, Helfgott’s surviving sister Mala was taken to the Ravensbrück Women’s camp and he and his father stayed together until they arrived at Buchenwald. “It was a terrible place. All we had to eat was soup that smelled like urine, and a crust of bread,” he says. Helfgott was subsequently sent to other camps, while his father was eventually rounded up for one of the death marches and was shot trying to escape.

After the liberation of Theresienstadt, the last in his long chain of camps, one of Helfgott’s fellow inmates said he was joining a group going to England. Helfgott joined him and arrived in Britain at 15 in 1945, along with 750 other children flown in by the Royal Air Force to be settled in hostels run by Jewish organisations. The new Labour government had agreed that 1 000 youngsters, nearly all concentration camp survivors, could be granted entry permits. After initially being lodged in a hostel near Windermere, he went to London, gained a place at Plaistow County Grammar School, and passed his higher school certificate, just a couple of years after he had arrived in Britain.

His passion for sport led him to join the Primrose Club for young survivors, run by German athlete Paul Mayer, who had been hoping for a place in the 1936 Berlin Olympics until the Nazis banned him because he was Jewish. Taking a particular interest in weightlifting, Helfgott competed in a series of competitions and became national lightweight champion in the early 50s. In Melbourne in 1956, and in Rome four years later, he was captain of the competing team. Although he won no medals in either event, he subsequently came away with a gold medal at the Maccabiah Games in Israel, three consecutive times.

Helfgott went on to become a clothing manufacturer and a prominent member of the Jewish community, helping to form the Holocaust Survivors ’45 Aid Society, serving on the Board of Deputies and acting as a trustee of the Holocaust Education Trust for 30 years. It was for his tireless efforts that this Polish-born, former champion weightlifter was included in the Queen’s birthday honours for his work on Holocaust education this month.

According to Jewish News, a Cabinet Office spokeswoman said: “Ben has worked tirelessly, over many decades, to encourage community cohesion and combat intolerance and hatred. He has used his public profile as a Holocaust survivor to ensure that Holocaust commemoration has remained on the national agenda.”

Said Karen Pollock, the Chief Executive of the Holocaust Educational Trust, “This is marvellous news and so deserved. Soon after he was liberated from the concentration camps, Ben knew that the story of what happened to him, his family and the six million Jews murdered by the Nazis must be told. He helped shape Holocaust education in the UK, campaigned for a memorial in London, and for a national day to remember the Holocaust.”

1 Comment

1
Harvey H. Shenker
29 Jun

If it were to become possible, Ben should be cloned.
I came across this present site via Desert Island Discs.Ben was my weightlifting trainer (I guess, but am no longer certain), way back in the 1950's.
I wish him all he wishes for himself.
A truly great man.